Pages

Tuesday, 21 May 2013

Book Review and Give away - Whole Grain Vegan Baking

Welcome to my stop on the blog tour for Whole Grain Vegan Baking! Happy to have you here and happy to be showcasing this book.

Tami and Celine bring you a comprehensive look at vegan baking - from a healthy perspective. Using whole grains, minimally processed sweeteners, and better-for-you fats they pack a huge number of tasty treats into this book. The photos are lovely (taken by Celine of course) and the book is user friendly - nice layout to the recipes, and logical chapter groupings.

The only bad thing for me about this book is that I couldn't make many recipes, being as I am now eating gluten-free, and there is a reliance on gluten containing whole grains for most of the recipes. However, I do look forward to at some point trying to switch up the whole grain flour to get gluten free alternatives which work!

I made -
Page 26 More-than-Maple Granola
Not too sweet, and tasty. This one I didn't have to make any changes to.

Page 29 Morning Boost Muesli
Original recipe and photo follows.
I changed the cracked wheat for steel cut oats, and used old fashioned rolled oats for the spelt and kamut flakes. I also omitted the wheat germ. I added the pineapple as suggested. Very tasty, if tricky having to remember to get it done the night before!

Thanks to Celine and Tami (and their publishers) for letting me reproduce the recipe.

Morning
Boost Muesli

We know, we know: There’s technically
nothing baked about muesli, but this is a whole grain book after all, and we
love muesli too much not to sneak in a recipe for it. Loaded with cracked
wheat, wheat germ, heart-healthy spelt flakes, and pleasantly chewy kamut
flakes, this breakfast will ensure you won’t get hungry again before lunch.

Combine the water, cracked wheat, and salt in a medium saucepan, and
bring to a boil. Lower the heat, cover with a lid, and cook until the water is
absorbed, about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside to cool slightly
while preparing the rest.

Combine yogurt, juice, spelt and kamut flakes, dates, pecans, and
wheat germ in a large bowl. Stir the cooked cracked wheat into the muesli,
cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate overnight to let the flakes plump up.
Stir the muesli again before serving. Eventual leftovers will keep well for up
to 2 days after preparation when stored in an airtight container in the
refrigerator; stir before serving.

Yield: 3
cups (855 g), 2 large to 4 more modest servings

Serving
Suggestions & Variations

• For a fruitier muesli, add 248 g (11⁄2 cups) of fresh pineapple
chunks, chopping them finely before stirring them in. Other fruits, such as
fresh or thawed berries, would also be fantastic when added upon serving, to
further increase the fiber and vitamin profile of this healthy breakfast.

Recipe note

Date crumbles are nuggets made from dried dates, with only oat flour
added to prevent clumping. They’re ideal to use in baked goods because there’s
no sticky chopping involved, but you can replace them with regular chopped
dates without missing a beat.

Now the give away - only to residents of the US and Canada (the publishers rules not mine) - please comment with your favourite way to eat cereal for breakfast (seeing as the recipes I made were both breakfast cereals) to go into the draw to win your very own copy!
Closes 26th May @ 6pm Pacific.

I know I'm not a resident of Canada but my sister is, so if I win I'd like to give it to her because she likes to bake. I usually eat oatmeal porridge for breakfast. Sometimes with raisins or cinnamon or using part some other oats. Nothing very exciting.

One of my favourite ways to eat cereals for breakfast is to make coucou, a (naturally gluten-free!) recipe I've learned when I was living in the Caribbean. It's basically polenta made with coconut milk, to which I usually add shredded coconut and dried fruits. It's good when it's just been made and is still soft, and leftovers are *great* the next day when the coucou has set: it can then be sliced and reheated in a frying pan. Yum!(Feel free to email me if you want my recipe! Being gluten-free too, I know how hard it can be sometimes to find new ideas for breakfast...)

It's so crazy to me that you focused on cereal because cereal has become my obsession sometime over the past few months! The two constants that I add into all of my cereals are slivered almonds and raisins. I was actually saying today that I probably need to stop eating so much cereal, haha...but now I have something new that I want to try :). Thanks for the recipe and the opportunity to win the book! dreamloudDOTrhATgmailDOTcom.

Nut Topped Hazelnut and Almond Bundt Cake

Does anyone read this?

Gingerbread.

Look at all the ginger in there!

Any recipes posted here are of my own devising unless otherwise stated. I will always provide credit for recipes, and inspiration, where applicable and links where possible. I would appreciate the same courtesy.